Oct. 31: Tending the Dead – Ancestors

image courtesy of klimkin via pixabay.com

On my website, Cerridwen’s Cottage, I have a section on Tending the Dead, which is a series of rituals I do when the veil is thin for several days around Samhain. The rituals are a little different every year, but the information on the site gives the basic structure.

This year, things are complicated, because Mercury turns retrograde today. Most of the time, when Mercury goes retrograde, I don’t perform magic, and only the most basic ritual of gratitude. I focus on the daily advice Tarot card readings and my daily meditation sessions.

Having Mercury Retrograde fall during this time is a complication.

The best way I have to deal with it is to keep things simple. Keep your casting simple, keep your words simple. Make sure you are clear and there’s no wiggle room. Focus on healing and gratitude. Don’t ask for information; it’s likely to be skewed.

I always do a tarot reading for the year on Samhain, using an Action Card and an Energy card (two different decks) for each month. I’m concerned that today’s will be skewed.

At the same time, the researcher and note-taker in me is interested to see how it stacks up.

Tonight, Samhain, is the night I honor my Ancestors. I’ve done some genealogical research, and there are several of the women in my lineages to whom I feel particularly drawn. I also honor my father, who died when I was ten, tonight, and the relatives I actually knew.

I do this as part of my Samhain ritual.

Tonight’s will be much simpler than usual, but still with intent. I have company this year, and will be sharing the ritual with that individual, who is someone I’ve known for a long time and trust.

Samhain 2017: Endings and Beginnings

 Tues. Oct. 31, 2017
Waxing Moon
Neptune Retrograde
Uranus Retrograde

This blog has been fallow for quite awhile now. I quieted down because I had trouble articulating the inner work I did. So much of a spiritual process is experiential rather than theoretical when you attempt to live your path.

I’m starting up again in an attempt to articulate this particular part of my personal journey. The writing journey is tied to it, and yet, in some forms, separate.

When will I post? I hope to post on turns of the moon and particular days that have meaning for me. I can’t promise it will be “every” day of a particular week, but I hope to post once a week or once every two weeks.

Since I moved from New York City to Cape Cod, many things have changed (understatement). As of March, I will be ready for my Croning Ceremony. I don’t mind many things about aging, although I resent losing physical strength. A good deal of that is on me, since I haven’t maintained weight training that would have helped. I need to add that back into my routine.

But my yoga and mediation practices have grown in beautiful ways. They have provided ballast through difficult and frightening times. I hope both continue to grow as I enter this new phase of life — chronologically, I am an “Elder,” yet I feel I know less (in some respects) then when I was much younger. Or maybe I’m wise enough to know how little I’ve always known!

But at least I’m curious enough to find out.

I suspect I’m in my second Saturn Return (the first hit early, and I think the second has, too). That would explain a lot of 2016 & 2017! I would have to re-run the transits in my chart and overlay them on my birth chart.

I have a garden here, which I couldn’t have when I lived across the street from the Port Authority Bus Terminal on the Deuce in New York. I’ve learned a lot about gardening (although never enough), and grown many of my own vegetables and herbs. My herbal knowledge has grown, although not as fast or as wide as I anticipated.

I moved here with certain expectations. Living here was my goal for years before I actually did it. At first, it was Wonderland. It seemed the reality of living here far surpassed the fantasy. But, gradually, they moved further and further apart.

Much of that is on me. I’d never been a civilian before. I spent my entire working life in the theatre. What did I know about the world outside of the arts? I only visited when I had to. Far too much of my dissatisfaction with my life here has been because I worked hard to be a “good sport” and to try to fit in (which makes no sense; I didn’t try to fit in during grammar school or high school or college, so why now?), and to meet other people’s expectations instead of my own. I capitulated far too often when I should have negotiated harder for a compromise.

NONE of the capitulations paid off. Not emotionally, not creatively, and certainly not financially.

I’m in the process of changing that. It makes certain people around me uncomfortable. Too bad for them.

I achieved many of my dreams throughout my life, especially on a creative level, because I wouldn’t capitulate. Or, sometimes, even compromise. I need to take back some of that youthful determination and meld it with some of the life lessons I’ve learned in the interim.

That is my focus for the next cycle. To use garden terminology, I have hacked away many parts of my life that are no longer working, and mulching, fertilizing, and preparing the ground for new plantings. Some will work, some will not. That’s all okay. Because I have every intention of enjoying every moment of the process.

Today, at this time of closure and fresh beginnings, let yourself release what no longer works. Remove clutter from your life — the human clutter and the object clutter. Make room for something fresh and new that can improve your life on all levels.

I will do my ritual tonight, and preparation for the coming year. I will cut away and put forth new desires. I will give thanks for all I have learned, and ask for blessings to use it wisely.

I’m planning my next post for November 4, the Full Moon.

Blessings on this night of Samhain and for the coming year!